"I'll be out of the office from Monday, 12/14, and will be back on Monday, 12/21."
Even if I do have access to my email while I’m vacation, I typically do “I’m out of office with no access to email or voicemail until (date). For anything requiring immediate attention please contact (boss).” If I happen to check my email I can still forward the important ones, but otherwise hopefully people get the message that I will not be responding.
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I thought it was cute and could tell that the person writing it probably spent a lot of time on the road and needed a shorthand for updating their message.
Have you ever considered how your office design could be having a negative impact on the way your employees work?
24. "Thank you for calling [company]. We're closed for [holiday] from [date] until [date]. Please leave your message and we'll get back to you as soon as possible. Have a happy holiday season!"
“There is nothing so terrible as activity without insight.” - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe I realize it can be tough to justify putting in the time ...
How you end a letter is important. It’s your last chance to make a good first impression on your reader. Choose the wrong closing, and you might damage the goodwill you have built up in the rest of your communication.
Dear Customer, Our office is closed and you can expect to hear back from me by [date]. Have a great holiday! Regards [Name/signature]
I appreciate your message. I am out of the office currently with no office email access. However, return on the following [date-of-return].
However, when I email the backup person I also cc the original person. If the issue gets totally resolved, the original person is well aware. If the issue is not resolved, the original person can pick it up pretty easily.
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Not sure how to embed an animated gif in your signature? Here's how to spice up your next out of office reply and add an animated gif.
She’s not sure how long that author would’ve argued with her computer until she turned it off.
I think the problem is that “at your earliest convenience” is a formulaic convention that uses explicit, almost exaggerated politeness to basically issue a stern direction, meaning “as soon as you possibly can”. When you turn it into “at my earliest convenience” it’s unclear if you mean “whenever it’s convenient for me to get to it” (what the words say) or “as soon as I possibly can” (what the meaning of the formulaic original is). Or else it sounds like you didn’t quite understand how “at your earliest convenience” works.
I use a basic OOO message – “Hi! I’m out of the office x date(s). I will return your email when I’m back at my computer on x date. If you have an urgent matter, please contact x or y. Have a nice weekend/holiday/etc!/Thanks!” My office WANTS us to use more personal and witty OOO messages like this article’s message. And that stresses me out. I don’t want to spend time worried about whether my OOO is witty. I don’t want to annoy other people just looking for basic info like when am I back and who they can contact in the meantime. I correspond a lot with third parties on serious matters (legal), and I don’t think a message like that is appropriate. So, I just keep using my basic message and hope my supervisor’s supervisor doesn’t email me and see that I’m not “trying.” Ugh.
On the other hand, there may be times where you’re so embedded in a project that you truly need to stay connected while you’re out. If that’s the case, say so clearly with a message like this: “I’m away but will be checking messages regularly, so don’t hesitate to contact me directly at any time.” Saying anything less than this may cause people to try to respect your time away and work around you, which in this case could create problems.
I don’t think it’s rude to do the deletion, but it’s pretty rude to not give some sort of Plan B besides “Wait until I decide I am ready to deal with you.” I’m sure it feels lovely to set up if you’ve usually got a lot of annoying people clamoring for your time on matters that aren’t nearly as urgent as they think, but to not even offer a “in case this is urgent, contact X” fig leaf just shows you don’t care.